Humility Read online

  Soon darkness fell over. The weather was hot during the day, but chilly in the evening. The children were tired and hungry. They got thirsty and the little girl began to cry. They found a well in a yard and the mother went to get some water. Anne realized that water was poisoned. She did not know how she understood that, at first she was shocked, but she was not sure. Unfortunately she was just an invisible presence with little opportunity to influence those who were still alive. He decided to lull the little man with the fluffy hair, olive eyes and skin like alabaster. While the mother was trying to pull the heavy tin bucket with water, the boy curled sideways and fell asleep. The children stood obediently aside, so as not to fall into the well because its wooden structure was almost destroyed. The woman, not to fall in, almost got the bucket lean with the help of the rope, so there was just little water in it. There was not enough for all. So she gave some just to the little girl and the remainder poured into an empty plastic bottle. They looked for the little kid, it seemed the remaining water was meant for him. They wondered whether to wake him up. Then the youngest daughter started to vomit. The mother took the bread to give to the child, but it was in vain. For two hours they were trying to help. The youngest boy was sleeping. Finally, the seven-year-old girl died. One of the twins took the plastic bottle with water and threw it in the ruins of the house. He had guessed. The mother started pulling her hair and weeping. Anna was constantly encouraging them by sending them positive waves. Finally, one of the twins wiped his tears with his fists and shook his mother with both his hands. They found a clean place, laid the little sister and covered her with pieces of boards. It had become dark, but the stars and the moon were throwing gleaming lights over the woman and the children. They left. The big girl was crying, but took the bundle and the mother took the little man sleeping on his hands and let the two twins go in front. But one of them tripped over a wire and fell badly. It was clear that they could not move safely in the dark. They looked around. There was a building, almost untouched and stable. Only the windows were broken. They got in. They got to the second floor. There was no electricity, so they decided to stay in the first room they found. They found beds and clothes. They covered themselves with blankets and the children fell asleep.

  Anna rose again to see if there was any danger for her little boy. The battle in the west had stopped. To the east in the hospital there was a commotion. She decided to examine the medical building. Finally she came into a journalist who had hid in the morgue and was broadcasting the news live. They were shocking. It turned out that the rebels had chemical weapons and they had an ultimatum to the military forces to surrender within two days. By mortified, but artistic voice, the reporter announced that the next day is the deadline. Once the transmission was over, the journalist shouted on the phone. He was swearing that he had expected a helicopter to come and pick him up, but they had not sent yet. He spoke in English. She rose and sought his angels - keepers. They appeared immediately. Bell X18 "asked" her whether she was about to give up. They communicated in a special way - by exchanging "texts". Somewhere between pictures, film and sound and sentences. But it was none of these. Rather, universal characters.

  "No, no way, under no circumstances! There is still a chance the boy! "

  "You know, we should not help you!" - Anna could not get whose thought she had grasped as a response - White’s or Black’s, but this time, it did not matter.

  "I know, but what prevents you from saving me some time? You should know where they had stored the chemical warfare. Just show me, give me some directions, not to wander looking for. "

  BlackX18 explained:

  "The rebels have a base on the outskirts of the city. There they keep the ammunition, possibly the warfare agents and chemicals "

  "But I will not tell you where this place is because you have to operate within a radius of several kilometers from the human - subject, whom you keep" - said the white angel.

  Anna once again made sure that they understood everything she thought. She knew exactly who "was speaking". Furthermore, there was no chance to break the rules by which she was introduced at the beginning of the mission. She had guessed that the regulations come from someone higher than them in the angelic hierarchy. All in all, it was not so important for her.

  She walked again into the city to the boy. The family was asleep, even the mother had dozed off. It dawned on her that all turned to the small guy with Baz. That's right, the name of the five-year kid was Baz. And the circumspect twin was Hyulal. They had been away with the problem, but if tomorrow they launched the chemical poison gas she could not save them. For the little girl she could not do anything ... She thought. The soldiers were pushed almost to the hospital, which meant that building was a target - the purpose of the rebels’ attack. There was probably a spy of theirs, someone who would try, probably tonight, to leave the region and to inform them about the situation.

  She immediately went to the hospital. He began walking through all the rooms and floors. So many times did she climb the stairs and explore the rooms! In this well-preserved building there had gathered several thousand people. Each of the townspeople tried to get to this place. Anna could not track people who were leaving. The military officers constantly brought wounded people. It occurred to her to look for the journalist again. She did not know how, but she found him in one of the garages on the ground floor. Two armed men with beards had put him in an open jeep and one of them was explaining in quite spoiled English that he had to witness the action on the next day, in order to be released in the global information network. They departed and no one stopped them. They moved at a great speed. They quickly found themselves at the base of which the angles were probably "talking" about. If she had not got into the car, Anna could not have moved with such a speed to the nest of the insurgents, but thus she made it. So there was something in her, something tangible, which can be attached - in this case, to the car. She simply got to it in a deductive way, because she could not see anything of herself. She did not look for the white and black angel – she had broken the rules and did not know if they would not try to stop her. She had no idea what she had to do, and she did not know much about her own skills. But there was her intention to do something and she was determined to do something.

  The bearded rebels took the reporter to their chief. Then two people put gas masks, and gave one to the representative of the media and again drove away into the jeep. They reached a small airport where a plane was waiting. She boarded with them and when they took off she already knew what would happen in minutes. So, using with all her strengths, she tried to infuse the journalist with this determination. The man was not stupid, he knew that he would die with the bearded fanatics. Anna manages to put the idea in his head, as a kind of suggestion, that he could save thousands, and in any good coincidence – he could save himself, too. The reporter had a folding knife in his boots. He bent slightly and pulled it out. The two rebels were shouting, talking, they were apparently high, on drugs. The journalist deftly jabbed in the neck the one sitting next to him and grabbed the gun from his hands, the other was the pilot; he was not armed. He began to shoot. He killed them. The plane was left without the pilot and began to fall. Ana focused her attention to the parachutes. The reporter had already noticed them. He managed to jump over the other, before the unmanned aircraft hit the ground and exploded. People had long left this part of town where the plane exploded. It was already dawning. Anna had hung to the reporter with the parachute. She did not know where she was, if she was near or far from the ruined building where she had left Baz. She had no idea how to reach the little black boy again. She thought that the child was doomed. At least she saved a few thousand people. She walked through the destroyed neighborhoods, farther, to the east. There were some inside sense or feeling of direction, but she was not convinced of it. She wondered why if she was ethereal and had no real body, she could not move faster. Her guardian angels were not seen around. Actually they did not appear, but they were here w
ith her. She was more than convinced as she knew their thoroughness. Not before lunch was she able to find the hospital. He had been wandering for more than 10 earthly hours. There was excitement and commotion. There was a TV crew, too. They had heard about the heroic actions of the international reporter - who had risked his life and had saved thousands of people. Several people located in the area where the plane exploded (it turned out it was from the agricultural aviation) were injured by the poison gas. The journalist was one of them. They had already brought them for hospital treatment, so if she had waited where they landed by parachute, she would have arrived by the ambulance to the hospital even faster. But how she could assume that they would take and move them so soon.

  Anna had not found Baz and his family yet. During the day the streets of the ruined city seemed different. She was just wondering where else she could search for them, when she see them. Baz was holding the hand of his mother and his sister was carrying a bundle. The twins were not there with them. At this point a bus arrived, it was sent by the international foundation to help the victims of civil wars. Anna knew this organization. But she could not remember why and for what reason. The military officers separated the women and children and were settling them on the bus. Baz and his family also got in. She climbed into the bus. The elder sister began to sob and blab something. Probably it was something about the twins. Little Baz also started crying. They did not travel long. Outside the city there was a plane waiting for them to take them to the neighboring country where they could be accommodated in a refugee camp.

  Anna "saw" two angels around him.

  "Congratulations, you did a great job!" - BellX18 told her.

  "Bravo, with only minor violations, you succeeded in your mission!" - added Black X18.

  "I want to know what happened to the twins." – Anna said imperatively.

  "One of the twins did not want to wake up and walk, Hyulal made his mother to leave without them. He promised to catch up. Your job was to save Baz. "- The White Angel was kind enough to answer.

  Anna fell into that deep lack of memory that no longer frightened her, because it was already well known and familiar and she felt no fear. She could not resist the angels. She realized they did not want to interfere with her actions. It became clear that they had the control over her and her free will. Again they found themselves on the orange sphere Orange. But she was still considering one of her insights. The physical body of man brings them many degrees of freedom and one that is particularly important. The freedom to oppose – as much as to sacrifice their own life. If there was anything she knew about herself, it was that she was rebellious and unyielding. She could sacrifice herself for her cause. But she could not remember what exactly the cause of it was. Apparently her memory was not with her. Not here! Not on the sphere Orange or during the strange missions on the earth when she was only an ethereal presence, as well as the angels, the White one and the Black one. While being on the orange sphere she could “see” them, in all their golden dignity, in shining cloaks and hollow "faces" under their hoods, on earth they were something like transparent balls of smoke.

  Chapter 4

  Ana was getting bored on the sphere Orange. She was placed in the "office", designed especially for her. On large monitors she could watch 3D-natural sceneries for the life of the various types of ants, but she paid little attention. On earth, she didn’t like to watch television films about wildlife and geographical landmarks and now she resisted the task to study the earth ants and their nests, colonies and the flora of their surrounding environment. Although she remembers nothing of her life when she encountered something familiar, she "knew" what she liked and disliked. That is, if she saw again known entities and objects, she could think and recall what she feels for them. The black and white angels were certainly not in the Orange sphere. They must have gone to their head to report on the first task. She did, but at the cost of many violations and she was not sure whether royal angel – the ruler will respect the result.

  There come BlackX18. Anna sincerely rejoiced.

  "Where is Bell?" – She asked to start the "conversation."

  "He went to the Earth to choose the object for the second task."

  "It seems that the superior in command has scolded you, you are not in the mood

  "No, there is nothing like this."

  "Then, you are jealous that White angel has gone to Earth, and you come back to me pamper me here."

  "Angels cannot envy."

  "I understand you are no longer my angel - guardian."

  "Why do you think so?" - She sensed that he was surprised by this assumption.

  "Because angels do like those who they guard."

  "Ah, you speak of that notorious human affection. There is no such thing in us. "

  "And do you have any feelings at all or you are simply programmed transparent, robots with no flesh!"

  "We have!"

  "And what are they, if they are not a secret?"

  "Well, you are not supposed to know!"

  Anna felt angry and it made her happy. It was a condition known to her. There was Bell X18.

  "The second task is ready." - He said.

  The Black angel was silent. "This time I'll explain more exactly the parameters and the possible free actions not to do things like the last time."

  It seems their superiors had acknowledged the result of the first. She rejoiced. She listened intently to the second task.

  "The object of protection is a girl at the age of seven. You are not allowed to leave the settlement, neither by water nor by land. You'll have another substantial degree of freedom. Besides emotions, you will understand the language of humans. '

  "Hurray!" - shouting Anna, but she immediately stopped because she saw the faceless shadows in black and white hooded cloak to retreat abruptly. - "We can “hear” with no sound, what makes you scared and so much afraid? Why do you behave this way?"

  There was no response, let alone any answer. Again she fell into some undefined state of mind. She did not if they understand her know her, she didn’t know what exactly was happening.

  Then she went into the zone of absolute white and there she was in a village where all the houses, larger and smaller had the same architecture – two-storey buildings. The first floors had small windows with wooden shutters closed and pending terraces; the second floors were designed with high, narrow windows, standing apart at the same distance and covered with thick curtains. There were walls as high as a man’s height, which concealed courtyards and the streets were in fact narrow cobblestone paths. She found herself in one of the largest houses in the center, with beautifully furnished rooms upstairs. On the ground floor there were kitchen, the storage and the utility rooms.

  Here, in the smallest room in an old bed with iron legs and old blankets, there was a seven-year girl - lying, she was looking pale and sick, and her mother, a young woman with suspending gold ornaments on a worn, but neat dress, was c sitting on a wooden chair, crying. The child had a fever and needed a doctor. In walked an elderly woman, apparently a maid and started scolding:

  - I should not feel despair, my girl. Hyulaya will overcome the disease and will be better.

  The young mother stopped crying, then wiped with the back of her hands her tears and said:

  - Will my mother and my brother come?

  - No, they have refused. They know that the lord will not allow them.

  - What prevents them from seeing Hyulaya, Mom can understand what the illness is - her voice was trembling.

  - Since the lord bought all the fields of your father and gave your brother a job, they do not dare to say and do anything against his will. When you get a male child, things will be different. Now we can only pray.

  - I heard that "Doctors without Borders” have sent a doctor in our health service. Is it true?

  - Yes, I have already brought my granddaughter to him. A young man, really, but he helps a lot.

  - Well, let’s bring Hyulaya to him, if you
know him.

  - The Master ordered to pray only. I do not dare to go beyond his will. You’d better go upstairs and ask him, yourself.

  - He will not allow, he wants to get rid of our daughter.

  The old woman came out silently on her tiptoes, just like she had entered. Anna felt the bitterness and despair of the mother and wondered why not grab herself the tiny child and bring it to the health department for check-up. She rose up, and looked around the settlement. There was a normal movement of people, Caucasian, but predominantly dark-haired. The fact that there were only men walking along the streets impressed her, women could be seen in the yards, all in headscarves and veils. So, they were Muslims. There was no mosque. Well, it was time that she found the doctor. It somehow happened very easily. In the little old house where his office was located, it was full of people who were waiting. Men and boys. It seems women and girls had no right to consult a doctor. The doctor came out and announced that today was the day to visit those who were seriously ill at their home, but added that he would be back , if someone wanted to be examined, he had to wait.